John Marwood Cleese (Cheese) - Genealogy Genealogy Join the world's largest family tree Gender Share your family tree and photos with the people you know and love Build your family tree online Share photos and videos Ex-husband of Connie Booth ; Barbara Trentham and <private> Eichelberger (McBride) Father of <private> Cleese and <private> Cleese Managed by: Oct 27 1939 - Number 6 Ellesmere road, Weston-super-Mare, England, UK Parents: Reginald Francis Cleese (Cheese), Muriel Cleese (Cheese) (born Cross) Ex-wife: Oct 27 1939 - Weston Super Mare, Somerset, England Parents: Connie Booth, Alyce Cleese, Barbara Trentham, Jennifer Wade Children: Oct 1939 - Weston- Super-Mare, Somerset, England Parents: mother About John Cleese He is an English actor, comedian, writer and film producer. He achieved success at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, and as a scriptwriter on The Frost Report.

In the late 1960s he became a member of Monty Python, the comedy troupe responsible for the sketch show Monty Python's Flying Circus and the four Monty Python films: And Now for Something Completely Different, Holy Grail, Life of Brian and The Meaning of Life. In the mid 1970s, Cleese co-wrote and starred in, with first wife Connie Booth, the British sitcom Fawlty Towers. Later, he co-starred with Kevin Kline, Jamie Lee Curtis and former Python colleague Michael Palin in A Fish Called Wanda and Fierce Creatures. He also starred in Clockwise, and has appeared in many other films, including two James Bond films, two Harry Potter films, and three Shrek films. With Yes Minister writer Antony Jay he co-founded the production company Video Arts, responsible for making entertaining training films. Cleese was born in Weston-super-Mare, Somerset, the only child of Muriel (née Cross), an acrobat, and Reginald Francis Cleese (b. 1894), who worked in insurance sales.

His family's surname was previously "Cheese", but his father changed it to "Cleese" in 1915, upon joining the Army. Cleese was educated at St Peter's Preparatory School where he was a star pupil, receiving a prize for English studies and doing well at sport including cricket and boxing. At 13 he received an exhibition to Clifton College, an English public school in Bristol. He was tall as a child and was well over 6 ft when he arrived there. While at the school he is said to have defaced the school grounds for a prank by painting footsteps to suggest that the school's statue of Field Marshal Earl Haig had got down from his plinth and gone to the toilet. Cleese played cricket for the first team and after initial indifference he did well academically, passing 8 O levels and 3 A-Levels in mathematics, physics and chemistry. After leaving school he went back to his prep school to teach science before taking up a place he had won at Downing College, Cambridge where he studied law and joined the Cambridge Footlights Revue. There he met his future writing partner Graham Chapman.

Cleese wrote extra material for the 1961 Footlights Revue I Thought I Saw It Move, and was Registrar for the Footlights Club during 1962, as well as being one of the cast members for the 1962 Footlights Revue Double Take! He graduated from Cambridge in 1963 with a 2:1 classification in his degree. Despite his successes on The Frost Report, his father would send him cuttings from the Daily Telegraph offering management jobs in places like Marks and Spencer. Personal life: 1960s to 1980s - Cleese met Connie Booth in America during the late 1960s and the couple married in 1968. In 1971, Booth gave birth to Cynthia Cleese, their only child. With Booth, Cleese wrote the scripts for and co-starred in both series of the TV series Fawlty Towers, even though the two were actually divorced before the second series was finished and aired. Cleese and Booth are said to have remained close friends since. Cleese remarried in 1981, to American actress Barbara Trentham.

Their daughter Camilla, Cleese's second child, was born in 1984. He and Trentham divorced in 1990. It was also during this time that Cleese moved from the United Kingdom to California. 1990s to present - On 28 December 1992, he married American psychotherapist Alyce Faye Eichelberger. In January 2008, the couple announced they had split. The divorce was settled in December 2008. The divorce settlement left Eichelberger with £12 million in finance and assets; by the time she has received an agreed £600,000 a year for seven years, she will be the richer of the two. Cleese stated that "What I find so unfair is that if we both died today, her children would get much more than mine". He had begun to date American comedienne Barbie Orr in November 2008 but they split up in January 2009. In April 2010, Cleese revealed on The Graham Norton Show on BBC One that he had started a new relationship with a woman 31 years his junior, Jennifer Wade.

He is a vegetarian. During the disruption caused by the Eyjafjallajökull eruption in 2010 ( ) Cleese became stranded in Oslo and decided to take a taxi to Brussels. The 1500 km journey cost £3,300 and was completed with the help of three drivers who took shifts in driving Cleese to his destination where he planned to take a Eurostar to the UK. John Cleese - Biography - IMDb John Cleese Biography Showing all 148 items Jump to: Overview (4) | Mini Bio (1) | Spouse (4) | Trade Mark (6) | Trivia (64) | Personal Quotes (69) Overview (4) 6' 5" (1.96 m) Mini Bio (1) John Cleese was born on October 27, 1939, in Weston-Super-Mare, England, to Muriel Evelyn (Cross) and Reginald Francis Cleese. He was born into a family of modest means, his father being an insurance salesman; but he was nonetheless sent off to private schools to obtain a good education.

Here he was often tormented for his height, having reached a height of six feet by the age of twelve, and eventually discovered that being humorous could deflect aggressive behavior in others. He loved humor in and of itself, collected jokes, and, like many young Britons who would grow up to be comedians, was devoted to the radio comedy show, "The Goon Show," starring the legendary Peter Sellers , Spike Milligan , and Harry Secombe . Cleese did well in both sports and academics, but his real love was comedy. He attended Cambridge to read (study) Law, but devoted a great deal of time to the university's legendary Footlights group, writing and performing in comedy reviews, often in collaboration with future fellow Python Graham Chapman . Several of these comedy reviews met with great success, including one in particular which toured under the name "Cambridge Circus." When Cleese graduated, he went on to write for the BBC, then rejoined Cambridge Circus in 1964, which toured New Zealand and America. He remained in America after leaving Cambridge Circus, performing and doing a little journalism, and here met Terry Gilliam , another future Python.

Returning to England, he began appearing in a BBC radio series, "I'm Sorry, I'll Read That Again", based on Cambridge Circus. It ran for several years and also starred future Goodies Tim Brooke-Taylor , Bill Oddie and Graeme Garden . He also appeared, briefly, with Brooke-Taylor, Graham Chapman and Marty Feldman in At Last the 1948 Show (1967), for television, and a series of collaborations with some of the finest comedy-writing talent in England at the time, some of whom - Eric Idle , Terry Gilliam , Terry Jones , Michael Palin , and Chapman - eventually joined him in Monty Python. These programs included The Frost Report (1966) and Marty Feldman 's program Marty (1968). Eventually, however, the writers were themselves collected to be the talent for their own program, Monty Python's Flying Circus (1969), which displayed a strange and completely absorbing blend of low farce and high-concept absurdist humor, and remains influential to this day.

After three seasons of the intensity of Monty Python, Cleese left the show, though he collaborated with one or more of the other Pythons for decades to come, including the Python movies released in the mid-70s to early 80s - Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975), Life of Brian (1979), Monty Python Live at the Hollywood Bowl (1982), and The Meaning of Life (1983). Cleese and then-wife Connie Booth collaborated in the legendary television series Fawlty Towers (1975), as the sharp-tongued, rude, bumbling yet somehow lovable proprietor of an English seaside hotel. Cleese based this character on a proprietor he had met while staying with the other Pythons at a hotel in Torquay, England. Only a dozen episodes were made, but each is truly hilarious, and he is still closely associated with the program to this day. Meanwhile Cleese had established a production company, Video Arts, for clever business training videos in which he generally starred, which were and continue to be enormously successful in the English-speaking world.

He continues to act prolifically in movies, including in the hit comedy A Fish Called Wanda (1988), in the Harry Potter series, and in the James Bond series as the new Q, starting with The World Is Not Enough (1999), in which he began as R before graduating to Q. Cleese also supplies his voice to numerous animated and video projects, and frequently does commercials. Besides the infamous Basil Fawlty character, Cleese's other well-known trademark is his rendition of an English upper-class toff. He has a daughter with Connie Booth and a daughter with his second wife, Barbara Trentham . Education and learning are important elements of his life - he was Rector of the University of Saint Andrews from 1973 until 1976, and continues to be a professor-at-large of Cornell University in New York. Cleese lives in Santa Barbara, California. - IMDb Mini Biography By: Larry-115 Spouse (4) Usually plays uptight or overbearing comic characters.

Mustache His height When on Monty Python's flying circus, he would introduce sketches with the famous line "And now for something completely different" Received pronunciation Playing characters with neurotic behaviour Trivia (64) Member of the comedy group "Monty Python". Father of 2 daughters; Cynthia Cleese (born 1971) with Connie Booth and Camilla Cleese (born 1984) with Barbara Trentham . Holds a law degree from Cambridge University. Co-wrote several episodes of Doctor in the House (1969) and its sequels with Graham Chapman , and also wrote some later episodes as sole author. He was a cast member of the highly successful radio show "I'm Sorry, I'll Read That Again". His fellow cast members were Tim Brooke-Taylor , Graeme Garden , Bill Oddie , David Hatch and Jo Kendall . It was during this radio show that Cleese's famous 'Ferret Song' (later sung on the television series, At Last the 1948 Show (1967)) was first heard. Was a member of the prestigious Cambridge University Footlights Club.

Went to the United States with the Footlights stage show "Cambridge Circus" in 1964, and appeared on the Ed Sullivan 's The Ed Sullivan Show (1948). When he had to join the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists in 1989, for his third appearance on American TV, none of the staff at the AFTRA office recognized him, or had any idea who he was. Ever since one of his most famous Monty Python sketches, The Ministry of Silly Walks, he has found himself continually pestered by admirers to do silly walks for them. He has stated that the sketch was born during a moment of silly improvisation, and he himself doesn't particularly care for it. Who's Who lists his recreations as "gluttony, sloth." Rector of University of St Andrews from 1970-1973. According to Brian Henson , when Cleese guest-starred on The Muppet Show (1976), he enjoyed the show very much and became very close with the writers because he wanted to get involved in the writing.

When he did get involved with the writing, he and the other writers came up with a concept where Cleese was being held against his will on the show and would try to get off the show while the Muppets were trying to get him to do his scheduled bits. Of course, in this case, life did not imitate art, as a few years later, Cleese appeared again with the Muppets in the film The Great Muppet Caper (1981). Is an Andrew D. White Professor-at-Large at Cornell University. Co-owns the Christine Schell Fine Objects antique shop in Montecito, CA. John's father's name was Reg Cleese but his grandfather was named John Edwin Cheese. His father changed his name when he joined the British army in 1915. Reached adult height of 6'5" by the age of 13. He was already six feet at age 12. Said he was to be the first person to say the F-word at a memorial service when he spoke at Graham Chapman 's. His mother, Muriel Cleese (b.

Cross, 5 October 1899 - 5 October 2000) died on her 101st birthday. The inspiration for Fawlty Towers (1975) came from a hotel stay he had with the other Pythons in the Gleneagles Hotel in Torquay, England. The hotel manager was called Donald Sinclair, someone Cleese considered to be the rudest man he had ever encountered. He later played a character by the name of Donald P. Sinclair in Rat Race (2001). When he left the Monty Python team, he was approached by the BBC to do something else, and together with Booth, created "Fawlty Towers (1975)" based on their experiences in a Torquay hotel. In the late 1990s he appeared in German TV commercials for a lottery service. He actually spoke German in some of these spots (while some had no dialogue and others were dubbed later on). When the Globe Theatre was rebuilt in London, a service was offered whereby you could have your name on a tile in the courtyard, for a donation to the project.

Cleese and fellow python Michael Palin both signed up for tiles, but Palin's was spelled wrong. Cleese paid extra to ensure it would be spelled "Pallin." Was the tallest member of Monty Python, having been about 2 inches taller than Graham Chapman . Father-in-law of Ed Solomon . He was offered the title of C.B.E. (Knight-Commander of the British Empire) in 1996. Turned it down because, in his own words, "The title doesn't get the same admiration and respect from the general public that it does from those who actually bestow it - you don't get to be addressed as 'Commander Cleese,' in my case - which somewhat nullifies the point of it all." Similarly, Cleese was offered inauguration to the House of Lords but turned that down as well; according to himself, "It would have had a very nice ring - 'Lord John of Cleese', I mean - but on the other hand, I would have been obligated to stay in London all through the winter...because that's when they meet in Parliament to vote on whatever-have-you. And *nobody* in their right mind lives in London during the bloody winter!".

Biography in: "Who's Who in Comedy" by Ronald L. Smith. Pg. 108-109. New York: Facts on File, 1992. ISBN 0816023387 Appeared in a series of educational short subjects produced by the British company Video Arts designed to teach management and trainees how to handle stress and unusual situations. Cleese took advantage of his comic talents and portrayed events as absurd situations so that audiences would better remember their training. In 2002, he appeared in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (2002), with Maggie Smith , and in Die Another Day (2002), opposite her son, Toby Stephens . Terry Gilliam noted among his Monty Python co-stars that there seemed to be a division between the taller, more "aggressive" Cambridge men (Cleese, Graham Chapman , & Eric Idle ) and the shorter, lighter-humored Oxford men ( Michael Palin & Terry Jones ), the latter of which the American Gilliam found himself closer to. Gilliam considered Cleese the most "Cambridge" of the group, being the tallest and most "aggressive" member of Monty Python.

Voiced Jean-Bob, a frog who believes he's a prince, in The Swan Princess (1994), then went on to voice a king who used to be a frog in Shrek 2 (2004). Has played the father of two of the Charlie's Angels. First he played Lucy Liu 's father in Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle (2003). The next year he played Cameron Diaz 's father in Shrek 2 (2004). Has resided for many years in the prestigious Chicago North Shore suburb of Lake Forest, Illinois. He was a supporter of the British Labour Party until the formation of the SDP (Social Democratic Party) in 1981, which he openly supported in the 1980s. When the SDP merged with the Liberal Party, he supported the newly formed Liberal Democrats. Has said that Cornell University is set in one of the most beautiful locations on earth. In 2005, offered a part of his colon, removed due to diverticulitis, for sale on his official website. The proceeds are reportedly to be divided between Cleese himself and his surgeon. Father Reg Cleese was an insurance salesman.

As a child loved the radio comedy show "The Goon Show". A newly discovered species of lemur, avahi cleesei, was named after him in honor of his love of the endangered primates, which figure prominently in his movie, Fierce Creatures (1997). He and Terry Gilliam are the only members of Monty Python to be nominated for Oscars. Coincidentally, they were both for Best Original Screenplay, Gilliam for Brazil (1985) and Cleese for A Fish Called Wanda (1988). Both screenplays did not win their Oscars, and both films featured Michael Palin . Campaigned long, hard but unsuccessfully to win the role of Brian in Monty Python's Life of Brian (1979) because he wanted to expand his range in his first substantial film role, but the rest of the group favored the late Graham Chapman , and eventually the group persuaded Cleese that Chapman was better suited to the part of Brian and Cleese stepped aside. Just to see if anyone would notice, during the early 1970s Cleese added one obviously fake film per year to his annual filmography listing in Who's Who.

For the record, these fake films were "The Bonar Law Story" (1971), "Abbott & Costello Meet Sir Michael Swann" (1972), "The Young Anthony Barber" (1973) and "Confessions of a Programme Planner" (1974). Although Cleese confessed to the gag in the 1980s, mentions of these bogus films still appear from time to time in scholarly works on Cleese, including the entry in the Encyclopedia of Television, 1st ed. (1996) edited by Horace Newcomb. Before becoming an actor, Cleese studied to be a lawyer. He went on to play a lawyer in A Fish Called Wanda (1988) and Splitting Heirs (1993). Was invited to the party Steve Martin was throwing that turned out to be his wedding. When he first started acting his original goal was to be a classically trained Shakespearean actor. The role of Cogsworth in Beauty and the Beast (1991) was written with him in mind, and no other actor was considered for the role. But he still turned it down.

Member of Monty Python along with Graham Chapman , Michael Palin , Terry Jones , Eric Idle and Terry Gilliam . During a 2014 interview in a Dutch talkshow, he debunked the story that he had offered to write speeches for Democratic Presidential candidate 'Barack Obama' in 2008. He had merely said that he liked many of the Democratic plans for the American people and would love to assist in any way. A local newspaper had interpreted this as an offer to help Obama writing his speeches, but Cleese considered Obama more than capable enough to write his own speeches. Helped his daughter, Camilla Cleese, to kick her drug habit (which started when she was 11) by sending her to a psychiatric ward and then a rehab clinic. After more stints in rehab, she finally kicked her drug and alcohol habit in 2007 and praised her father for helping turn her life around [December 21, 2008). Provided the voice of God in Spamalot. During the 2010 eruption of Eyjafjallajökull in Iceland, air travel across northern Europe was severely disrupted.

Cleese, in Oslo on April 17 but needing to get to London by April 19, paid £3,300 for a cab ride to Brussels to catch a ferry ride. Supports Bristol City Football Club. He suffered from depression between 1973 and 1976. He didn't learn to drive a car until 1976. He is a cat lover, particularly of the Siamese breed and once named 5 of them after types of cheese. Incidently, he was fond of cheese until he discovered he is lactose intolerant. He lives in Montecito, California. [June 2006] Currently touring New Zealand with his new stage show "John Cleese, His Life and His Current Medical Conditions" (or something very similar) [November 2005] Was on the tribute show to mark the BBC Television Centre's closing in 2012, along with Ronnie Corbett , Miranda Hart and David Jason . Has said in interviews that he loves 'really rude questions' because they are original and force him to think about an appropriate answer.

The best question he ever got was 'if you were a part of a plane, which part would you be?' His answer was 'the joystick'. Cleese first worked with Eric Idle and Grahan Chapman after he joined the Footlights Revue as a Cambridge student. He later wrote for David Frost, who had been a Revue member before Cleese joined. Cleese made many popular commercials for American TV including Kronenbourg beer, Sony, Compaq computers, Magnavox TV, and Schweppes. Cleese won libel damages in a January 1989 decision by the High Court in Lzondon.against a Simon Gallant, who had written that in real life Cleese resembled his characterization of the obnoxiously rude Basil Fawlty. Cleese's father was born Reggie Cheese, but changed the 'H' to an 'L' when he enlisted for WWII because he was fed up with all the predictable jokes. He is a fan of the singer Neil Diamond and has seen him in concert.

After moving to Monterey, California, he joked about going back to his old family surname of 'Cheese;' because 'Jack' is a nickname for 'John' (like 'Hank' is for 'Henry'), and he thought it would be fun to be known as 'Monterey Jack Cheese.'. Personal Quotes (69) [in 2001] I think there's much more fear now than there used to be, much more fear of failure. [in 2001] You go in and meet the head of BBC One and get an assurance about not dumbing down. And then, of course a few months later, he's been replaced by someone you haven't met. It's lovely that Harry Potter and the Bond movies are still shot in England - that's a great pleasure, but it's true that most of the well-paid work is in America. I never enjoyed The Meaning of Life (1983). I always regarded that entire film as a bit of a cockup. In Britain, girls seem to be either bright or attractive. In America, that's not the case. They're both.

[about his move from England to California] At my age, I want to wake up and see sunshine pouring in through the windows every day. I'm probably the worst singer in Europe. I won't compete for North America. When I was a child and I was upset about something, my mother was not capable of containing that emotion, of letting me be upset but reassuring me, of just being with me in a calming way. She always got in a flap, so I not only had my own baby panics, fears and terrors to deal with, but I had to cope with hers, too. Eventually I taught myself to remain calm when I was panicked, in order not to upset her. In a way, she had managed to put me in charge of her. At 18 months old, I was doing the parenting. My mum died about three years ago at the age of 101, and just towards the end, as she began to run out of energy, she did actually stop trying to tell me what to do most of the time. I don't think anyone should be educated sexually. There's far too many people on the planet. If we could hush it up for a few years, that would help.

If you wish to kill yourself but lack the courage to, I think a visit to Palmerston North will do the trick. You don't have to be the Dalai Lama to tell people that life's about change. I find it rather easy to portray a businessman. Being bland, rather cruel and incompetent comes naturally to me. When people say "I'm not a prude, but..." what they mean is "I am a prude, and..." [from the eulogy he gave at Graham Chapman 's memorial service] And I guess that we're all thinking how sad it is that a man of such talent, a man of such capability and kindness, of such unusual intelligence, should now, so suddenly, be spirited away at the age of only 48, before he'd achieved many of the things which he was capable and before he'd enough fun. Well, I feel that I should say "Nonsense!" Good riddance to him, the freeloading bastard, I hope he fries. Filming is like a long air journey: there's so much hanging around and boredom that they keep giving you food.

When (third wife) Alyce Faye Eichelberger had her hip replacement I realised that there was a chance for a little humour and I sent a bunch of flowers to her lawyer's office saying, 'Would you please inspect these flowers and see whether they are acceptable and would you please vet the greetings card that comes with these and see whether that is also legitimate. And if you are satisfied that both of them are not harmful, would you be good enough to send them on to my wife as soon as possible?' To which the lawyer replied: 'As the trade papers say, he's not as funny as he was.' The sort of leaden, nasty - what's the word? - black-hearted response to a little conceit. I think marriage should be like dog licences. I think you should have to renew marriage licences every five years, unless you have children. And I think before you have children you should have to go and pass various tests and get a licence to have a child. Because it's the most transformative and difficult thing of your life. Far more important [than work].

People don't understand this, and some people who are highly motivated by work, but when I worked I was always motivated, funnily enough, by the fear of being bad. Because it is so humiliating to make a joke and have no one laugh. I don't want to have to start being unselfish again. The great thing about being on your own is you do what you damn well like. I had a very, very difficult relationship with my mother, who was supremely self-centred. She was hilariously self-centred. She did not really take interest in anything that didn't immediately affect her." [on his divorce from Alyce Faye Eichelberger ] This is the happiest I have ever been and I feel that at 68 now I want as many years as I can get. It's very important for me that my friends have a sense of humour. To me it's the kind of touchstone of communication. Alyce Faye Eichelberger 's sense of humour was not very European, because she was from Oklahoma and I used to joke that the Oklahoma Sense of Irony is one of the world's short books. [on his divorce from Alyce Faye Eichelberger ]: I feel angry sometimes.

But my anger is not so much about sharing the property but having to go on working hard to provide alimony for someone who's already going to have at least $10 million worth of property, and who's getting £1 million this year. At some point you say, 'Well, what did I do wrong? You know, I was the breadwinner.' The system is insane. We broke up in the marital therapist's office. We'd been seeing them for a couple of years. And we agreed to break up and three weeks later I heard about the lawyer that she was using and I rang her up and said, 'Do you know this lawyer's reputation?' And she said, 'I hear that yours can be pretty nasty, too.' And I said, 'OK, here's an offer. You get rid of yours. I'll get rid of mine. I'll appoint someone you're comfortable with, you appoint someone I'm comfortable with and it could be fairly easy.' And she said, 'No, I'm not interested.

I would like to stay with the present situation.' When I got divorced from Connie Booth , with whom I had dinner on Sunday, and when I got divorced from Barbara Trentham , I didn't need lawyers on either occasion, because I just sort of said, 'Why don't I give you this?' And they said, 'That's very fair, very generous. Thank you.' End of story. This woman [ Alyce Faye Eichelberger ] now was asking my old St John's Wood accountants for 60 boxes of documents, so many documents that they had to send people out from California to go through them. [on BBC presenter Jonathan Ross 's obscene phone calls to his Fawlty Towers (1975) co-star Andrew Sachs in 2008] I'm uneasy about censorship so I think that it's important to hire people who have good enough taste to censor themselves. I've always thought that Jonathan Ross would have fallen into this category. [on making commercials to support himself and then-wife Connie Booth while writing Fawlty Towers (1975)] I have to thank the advertising industry for making this possible.

Connie and I used to spend six weeks writing each episode and we didn't make a lot of money out of it. If it hadn't been for the commercials I wouldn't have been able to afford to spend so much time on the script. Why anyone who has not committed a punishable offense would listen to country and western music is beyond me. I think that phone call was astoundingly tasteless. Apparently Russell Brand had actually slept with the girl, who works in a slightly raunchy club. Oh yes, a burlesque club. Anyway ... I can't imagine why they would ring Andrew ( Andrew Sachs ) up. It was, as I say, very tasteless. I thought that was extraordinary, especially as I've met Jonathan Ross and liked him; it's very hard to see why he would have done it. In the early days of my career, I'd have these moments of utter delight: at the age of 21, I discovered Buster Keaton ; at 24 it was Harold Lloyd ; then W.C. Fields . Just occasionally, one discovers someone new for oneself. I thought Bill Hicks was a genius, Eddie Izzard too.

I don't want to be mean but there are several highly regarded shows around right now - and I'm not talking about Ricky Gervais , because I think he's excellent - that I don't much care for. So basically I keep my mouth shut. At this stage of my life I have to accept that I'm not likely to come across anything as startlingly good as Buster Keaton . Most of the bad taste I've been accused of has been generic bad taste; it's been making fun of an idea as opposed to a person. Oddly enough, the one or two jokes I really regret on Python are the more personal ones. We did have this thing about David Hemmings ... something about him being played by a piece of wood. At the end there was a voice-over saying: " David Hemmings appeared by permission of the Forestry Commission." Afterwards, I felt just a little bit guilty. I think that money spoils most things, once it becomes the primary motivating force. I don't miss London much. I find it crowded, vast and difficult to get around. Cabs are incredibly expensive. England changed much more than I did. We used to have some sort of middle class culture with an adequate amount of respect for education.

It was a bit racist - not in a mean way though, but still racist. Some things have changed for the better. But it's not a middle class culture anymore, but a yob culture, a rowdy culture. I always felt attracted by Austrian and German culture in a certain way. I've always liked Vienna. I never saw so much theatre and music and so many museums anywhere else. I like the city's velocity and the food. It doesn't have the tackiness of other big cities. I considered renting a small flat in Switzerland. I love being in Lyon, Strasbourg, Munich and Milan in four hours from there. If I can get you to laugh with me, you like me better, which makes you more open to my ideas. And if I can persuade you to laugh at the particular point I make, by laughing at it you acknowledge its truth. The divorce settlement absolutely affects every decision I make professionally. I have to earn $1 million a year before I even get to keep a penny and I have to build my professional choices around that fact. It annoys me that in my seventies I am having to live in a way I don't choose to live.

Imagine how much I'd have had to pay Alyce if she had contributed anything to the relationship - such as children or a conversation. [on British television] When I was growing up, we had the best television in the world. Now it's as bad as it is everywhere else, and I don't particularly want to participate in that. I don't really watch TV these days, except live sport. There's nothing much that appeals to me and I would rather read a book. I was asked to do a reality show a few months ago. I forget which one it was, it might have been the jungle one or perhaps Celebrity Root Canal. I just laughed, then asked how much they were offering out of curiosity. It was £200,000, but I would never agree to one of those shows. That would mean the collapse of western civilization. There is always a filter when it comes to accepting work. I call it the EQ - the embarrassment quota. I will only do embarrassing things if there is a lot of money involved and people won't really know about it. Some people ask me to do ads and I think, I don't really want to sell potato crisps.

Although my inclinations are slightly left-of-center, I was terribly disappointed with the last Labour government. Gordon Brown lacked emotional intelligence and was never a leader. in Penelope Gilliatt, _To Wit: Skin and Bones of Comedy_, 1990] It's the people who try desperately to put a measured surface over secret anger seething away underneath who give you the sense of most violence. Someone telephonically knowledgeable and I had a bit of an argument about that. He said that telephone booths didn't work because they were vandalized. I said they were vandalized because they didn't work. [on why he has to avoid living in London during the 2012 Summer Olympics] I'm in a very strange situation. Because of the tax situation in the UK and because I have to pay this enormous alimony every year of one million dollars, I discovered that if I live in London, which I was intending to do, I have to make two million dollars before I keep a penny. That's quite a lot. So I'm not going to be living in London. The result of that for at least a year, I'm hardly allowed to go back there at all.

[on British television] I don't think the writers work as hard as they used to, and I think they may lack experience because I don't think the writing is as good as it used to be. But I do proudly say that in the 60s, 70s and 80s we did have the least bad television in the world, and that's quite a claim. I think the main problem now is it's run on the basis of money. [on Fawlty Towers (1975)] There is a famous note which I have a copy of, I think it's framed. What happened was, Connie and I wrote that first episode and we sent it in to Jimmy Gilbert ( James Gilbert ). And first of all the fellow whose job it was to assess the quality of the writing said, and I can quote it fairly accurately, 'This is full of clichéd situations and stereotypical characters and I cannot see it as being anything other than a disaster'. And Jimmy himself said 'You're going to have to get them out of the hotel, John, you can't do the whole thing in the hotel'. Whereas, of course, it's in the hotel that the whole pressure cooker builds up.

[on the BBC in 2013] The people who became executives [in the Sixties and Seventies] had produced or directed a great deal of comedy. Now there seems to be an executive class and they have never written and never directed. Movie executives have almost no idea what they're doing. In fact, I would say that's an incorrect statement. I would say the executives don't have ANY idea what they're doing. But they don't have any idea that they have no idea, so they're blundering around. They're trying to control everything without having a clue what's really going on. And that's very sad because if somebody put me in charge of BBC comedy, I could resurrect it in six months. At the moment, the people there are just very poor. I don't know what's going on in London because London is no longer an English city. That's how they got the Olympics, they said "We're the most cosmopolitan city in the world". But it doesn't feel English.

I had a Californian friend come over two months ago, walked down the King's Road and said to me "Where are all the English people?" I mean, I love having different cultures around but when the parent culture kind of dissipates, you're left thinking "What's going on?" The thing you have to remember about critics is that they can't do it themselves. [on the Daniel Craig Bond films] I did two James Bond movies and then I believe that they decided that the tone they needed was that of the Bourne action movies, which are very gritty and humorless. Also, the big money was coming from Asia, from the Philippines, Vietnam, Indonesia, where the audiences go to watch the action sequences, and that's why in my opinion the action sequences go on for too long, and it's a fundamental flaw. The audiences in Asia are not going for the subtle British humor or the class jokes. [improvising during the Parrot Sketch for Monty Python's "One down, five to go" at the O2] I'm rather worried about David Beckham . You see him around all the time, but he never talks.

The thing about shock is not that it upsets some people, I think; I think that it gives others a momentary joy of liberation, as we realized in that instant that the social rules that constrict our lives so terribly are not actually very important. [on a knighthood] I'll only have one if Python get one. We always thought it would be nice to actually have Sir Monty Python but not actually have knighthoods ourselves. The sad thing about comedy is that if you spend fifty years doing it, you do finish up knowing most of the jokes. And if you don't know the exact joke, you know something pretty close to it. There isn't the sense of discovery that you got when you were younger. Political correctness started out as a very good idea. But it got latched onto by people who hang onto a small number of truths. In my stand-up , I'll make jokes about Germans, Canadians, the English and the French - which Americans particularly enjoy. And then I say, 'There's this Mexican joke'. And the place freezes. Why is everyone uncomfortable? Is that because Mexicans need particular protection? Are they not capable of looking after themselves?

I don't think that you can edit humor because it may be misunderstood by idiots. [on his surprise cameo in the iconic science-fiction series Doctor Who (1963) in 1979] It was lovely to do. It just took an hour and a half, so I enjoyed it. Douglas Adams suggested to the director that we should do it. Piers Morgan writes that I didn't recognize him in a restaurant in New York. I did. I just didn't want to speak to someone I truly detest. I think we're all born with a sense of humour. Creativity is another thing . . . The thing that mainly kills creativity and humour is anxiety. You need to be able to play. I think a lot of us lose this ability. [about his home town] Childhood was very low key. Extremely little happened. Weston used to have a field-hockey festival, but that was stopped, as people were becoming too excited. [on his years of depression] Life seemed almost pointless... The feeling was a kind of deadness... And the sense of humor was an early casualty. In fact, when I began to be able to laugh at all, it began to clear.

[on seeing himself acting on film for the first time] I looked like a giraffe on a hovercraft. Now most people do not want an ordinary life in which they do a job well, earn the respect of their collaborators and competitors, bring up a family and have friends. That's not enough any more, and I think that is absolutely tragic - and I'm not exaggerating - that people feel like a decent, ordinary, fun life is no longer enough. [on Rupert Murdoch , the person he said he most despises] He did irreparable damage to English culture. [on how to reform the European Union] Give up the Euro, introduce accountability, and hang Jean-Claude Juncker . If I thought there was any chance of major reform in the EU, I'd vote to stay in. But there isn't. Sad. I'm more relaxed now but if I look at the world, I don't think it's ever been in a worse situation. I look at what's going on and there isn't much to be cheerful about. I look at Trump [ Donald Trump ], and I see a narcissist, with no attention span, who doesn't have clear ideas about anything and makes it all up as he goes along.

The Last Name for John Cleese Was Nearly Cheese - Unreal Facts The Last Name for John Cleese Was Nearly Cheese The Last Name for John Cleese Was Nearly Cheese Bir Tawil is a Small Piece of Land Not Claimed by Any Country Would you honestly believe that John Cleese’s real name should be Cheese? Yep, that’s right. Actor, comedian, producer and writer, John Cleese was nearly known as John Cheese. No, it wasn’t some odd celebrity stunt to draw attention to himself. It was, and really should have been his name, and John Cleese can thank his father for dropping Cheese from his surname. John Cleese is one of the best known British comedians today. Along with a motley crew of fellow actors and comedians, he is best known for his time with the Monty Pythons ensemble. They were the ones who are responsible for movies such as Monty Pythons Holy Grail, which featured a line in Game of Thrones , controversial film The Life of Brian and many other comedy classics. Cleese has also featured in many other popular films including A Fish Called Wanda, a couple of James Bond films, and some Harry Potter films. His versatility in acting styles is rarely matched.

But would he have been taken as seriously if people called him John Cheese instead of Cleese? His father didn’t think so. Now, his father didn’t change his surname to protect John. He did it for his own reputation. In fact, at the time that he changed the surname from Cheese to Cleese, John wasn’t even a twinkle in his fathers eye. o when exactly did he change it? Shortly after the outset of World War I, Cleese’s father, Reginald Cleese, joined the army to serve God and Empire. But when he signed up for service he was embarrassed with the family name. When he enlisted he decided to take matters into his own hands and changed it from Cheese to Cleese, effectively solving the embarrassing dilemma. Here are a few other bonus facts about John Cleese: He reached his imposing height of 6’4 3/4″ at age 13 He sold part of his colon that was removed after surgery. Not only does he sound smart, he is. He has a law degree from Cambridge University. His mother lived to the grand old age of 101.

The John Cleese Picture Pages A Fish Called Wanda Background: Academy Award-nominated and Emmy Award winning British comedian, actor and writer John Cleese began his comedy career with Cambridge's comedy troupe The Footlight Society before reaching fame as the founding member of the noted, ground-breaking comedy troupe Monty Python, along with Graham Chapman, Eric Idle, Terry Jones, Michael Palin and Terry Gilliam. With the group, he enjoyed success in “Monty Python's Flying Circus” (1969-1974). He evolved as an actor and writer in the Monty Python film projects “Monty Python and the Holy Grail” (1975), “Monty Python's Life of Brian” (1979) and “Monty Python's The Meaning of Life” (1983). The comic is best recognized in England as the star and writer of the BBC popular sitcom “Fawlty Towers” (1975, 1979), from which he took home a BAFTA Award for his role as hotel manager Basil Fawlty. Cleese tried his hand at other movies in the 1980s.

He won an Evening Standard British Film Award for his performance in “Clockwise” (1986) and picked up an Emmy Award for his guest turn on an episode of America's TV series “Cheers” (1987). He scored his biggest box office hit with the movie “A Fish Called Wanda” (1988), which he also co-wrote and co-produced. Cleese was handed a BAFTA Award for his acting and a David di Donatello Award and an Oscar nomination for his writing.

His more recent movie credits include “Fierce Creatures” (1997), “The Out-of-Towners” (1999), “Isn't She Great” (1999), the James Bond films “The World Is Not Enough” (1999, as R) and “Die Another Day” (2002, as Q), “Rat Race” (2001), the Harry Potter films “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone” (2001) and “Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets” (2002), “Charlie's Angels 2: Full Throttle” (2003), “Around the World in 80 Days” (2004), “Charlotte's Web” (2006), “Shrek 2” (2004) and “Shrek the Third” (2007). Cleese earned an Emmy nomination for his recurring role as Finney on the well-liked TV series “Will & Grace” (2003-2004). Cleese has been married three times.

He has two daughters, Cynthia Cleese (mother: actress Connie Booth) and Camilla Cleese (mother: Barbara Trentham). He is now married to Alice Faye Eichelberger. Law Degree Childhood and Family: John Marwood Cleese was born on October 27, 1939, in Weston-Super-Mare, Somerset, England, to Reginald Cleese, an insurance salesman, and Muriel. His family’s last name was originally “Cheese,” but was changed to “Cleese” after his father joined the army in 1915. As a child, John was educated at Clifton College in Bristol, but kicked out after defacing school grounds. Later he pursued a law degree at Downing College in Cambridge. On February 20, 1968, John was married for the first time to actress Connie Booth, but the bond ended in 1978 after producing one child, daughter Cynthia Cleese (born in 1971). He next married Barbara Trentham on February 15, 1981, and they welcomed a daughter named Camilla Cleese in 1983.

The couple divorced in 1990. John married his present wife, Alice Faye Eichelberger, on December 1992. “When I was a child and I was upset about something, my mother was not capable of containing that emotion, of letting me be upset but reassuring me, of just being with me in a calming way. She always got in a flap, so I not only had my own baby panics, fears and terrors to deal with, but I had to cope with hers too. Eventually I taught myself to remain calm when I was panicked in order not to upset her. In a way, she had managed to put me in charge of her. At 18 months old, I was doing the parenting.” John Cleese Fawlty Towers Career: John Cleese got his start in comedy with the celebrated performing society, Cambridge Footlights Revue, which he joined while he was studying for a career in law at Downing College, in Cambridge. There he began his partnership with Graham Chapman and Eric Idle. Other members David Frost, future National Lampoon editor Tony Hendra and future director of the Royal Shakespeare Company Trevor Nunn.

In 1961, Cleese penned extra material for “Footlights Revue I Thought I Saw It Move,” and was Registrar for the Footlights Club during 1962, as well as enlisted as one of the cast members for the 1962 “Footlights Revue Double Take!” He acted in and contributed to the script of the 1963 “Footlights Revue A Clump of Plinths,” which enjoyed huge victory during the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. The name was then altered to “Cambridge Circus.” The show was brought to West End in London and then went on tour in New Zealand and New York where it was shown on and off-Broadway. It also appeared on CBS' “The Ed Sullivan Show” in September 1964. Lured by the success of “Cambridge Circus,” Cleese decided to remain in America. He continued to perform in on and off-Broadway productions, including the musical “Half a Sixpence.” It was during that period that he met Terry Gilliam and his future wife, American screen beauty Connie Booth.

When his popularity as a comedian increased, Cleese was recruited as a writing staff member for BBC Radio, with which he worked on several programs, most notably the “Dick Emery Show” (1963). With the Footlights Revue's success, the studio recorded a short series of half-hour radio programs called “I'm Sorry, I'll Read That Again,” based on “Cambridge Circus.” It was so well-liked that the BBC ordered a regular series of the same name, which ran for several years from 1965 to 1974. Referred to as “John Otto Cleese” at the close of every episode, Cleese began performing on the radio show after his return to England from America. Cleese took his first crack at the small screen in 1966 when he played various roles on the BBC sketch comedy series “The Frost Report” (1966-1967). He also joined the writing staff of the show, which included Chapman, Brooke-Taylor, Oddie, Marty Feldman, Frank Muir, Barry Cryer, Ronnie Barker, Ronnie Corbett, Dick Vosburgh and future Python members Eric Idle, Terry Jones and Michael Palin.

Led by the popularity of “The Frost Report,” Cleese and Chapman were invited to work as writers and performers with Brooke-Taylor and Feldman on “At Last the 1948 Show” (1967). Cleese and Chapman also wrote for the pilot episode of the TV series “Doctor in the House” (1969) and “The Magic Christian” (1969) and “The Rise and Rise of Michael Rimmer.” By the late 1960s, the two were eventually allowed to develop their own program, but due to Chapman's dependency on alcohol, Cleese found himself having the larger workload in the relationship and halfhearted about doing a series with just the two of them. He then invited Michael Palin, with Chapman himself bringing Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle and Terry Jones, to join them. They reunited to form the Monty Python comedy troupe “Monty Python's Flying Circus,” a TV ensemble program of sketch comedy, which ran from October 1969 to December 1974 on BBC. Feeling the show's scripts had declined in quality, probably due to Chapman's alcoholism, Cleese became restless and decided to move on.

Although he stayed for the third season, he did not appear in the fourth and earned only minor writing credit. Cleese reunited with the group to write and co-star in the Monty Python motion pictures “Monty Python and the Holy Grail” (1975), “Monty Python's Life of Brian” (1979) and “Monty Python's The Meaning of Life” (1983). He had previously done the same duty for the group's first film, “And Now for Something Completely Different” (1971). After leaving Python, Cleese worked with the sitcom “Fawlty Towers,” which he co-penned with first wife Connie Booth. The show, which cast him as hotel manager Basil Fawlty, collected extensive critical raves and is still recognized as one of the best examples of British comedy. It also picked up three BAFTA awards with Cleese winning the Best Light Entertainment Performance category in 1980. “Fawlty Towers” was comprised of only twelve episodes, which were divided into two series. The first began on September 19, 1975, and the second returned on February 19, 1979.

During the 1980s, Cleese continued to act in numerous non-Python related British comedies, including “Privates on Parade” (1982), “Yellowbeard” (1983) and “Clockwise” (1986). The latter project, in which he starred as a sturdy British school headmaster, won him an Evening Standard British Film award. He also enjoyed some success in America with his appearances on TV commercials and his impressive small roles on Hollywood features such as “The Great Muppet Caper” (1981), Lawrence Kasdan's “Silverado” (1985) and “The Big Picture” (1989). In 1987, Cleese was honored with an Emmy for his memorable guest turn as Dr. Simon Finch-Royce in an episode of the American comedy series “Cheers,” starring Ted Danson. He doubled the prominence the following year with his work on the movie “A Fish Called Wanda” (1988), helmed by Charles Crichton.

In the movie, he starred as Archie Leach, opposite Jamie Lee Curtis as a sexy con artist, Kevin Kline as her macho boyfriend and ex-Python Michael Palin as a tormented animal lover. The comedy film was a huge hit at the box office with the total earnings of more than $200 million. In addition to performing, Cleese also wrote the screenplay and served as executive producer. He won a BAFTA Film for his acting and a David di Donatello and an Oscar nomination for his writing. Cleese maintained his hectic schedule during the next decade. He provided the voice of Cat R. Waul for the 1991 animated film “An American Tail: Fievel Goes West,” acted with former Python member Eric Idle and Rick Moranis in “Splitting Heirs” (1993), and played Professor Waldman in the Kenneth Branagh-directed “Mary Shelley's Frankenstein” (1994). He brought back the crew from “A Fish Called Wanda” for the less-appreciated “Fierce Creatures” (1997), which saw Cleese essentially recreate his “Fawlty Towers” role as the attack director of the Marwood Zoo.

The same year, he could also be seen working with three of the original six Python members (Idle, Jones and Palin) for Terry Jones' little seen “The Wind in the Willows,” which was adapted from Kenneth Grahame's 1908 classic novel, as well as voicing Ape, the mentor and father figure of Brendan Fraser's “George of the Jungle.” Two years later, Cleese experienced a banner year with three high-profile projects under his belt. He first supported Steve Martin and Goldie Hawn as an offensive hotel clerk in the remake of “The Out-of-Towners” and was then seen as R in the James Bond film “The World Is Not Enough,” starring Pierce Brosnan as 007. He also portrayed Simon & Schuster head Dick Snyder (called Henry Marcus) on the Jacqueline Susann biopic “Isn't She Great” (released in the U.S. in 2000).

The early millennium saw roles in such projects as the large ensemble comedy “Rat Race” (2001), the Eddie Murphy sci-fi comedy flop “The Adventures of Pluto Nash” (2002), the James Bond action feature “Die Another Day” (2002, as Q), the Harry Potter massively popular films “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone” (2001) and “Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets” (2002) and “Charlie's Angels 2: Full Throttle” (2003, as Lucy Liu's father). On television, he starred as the owner of a TV network in the short-lived sitcom “Wednesday at 9:30 (8:30 Central),” narrated episodes of “House of Moses” (2001-2002), and in 2003, joined the cast of the popular NBC sitcom “Will & Grace” in the pleasing recurring role of Lyle “Finney” Finster, the father of Minnie Driver's character and the love interest of Karen. The role brought Cleese a 2004 Emmy nomination for Best Guest Actor in a Comedy Series.

Cleese lent his voice for King Harold, Princess Fiona's Father, for the CGI sequel “Shrek 2” (2004), appeared as The Balloon Man in the Jackie Chan vehicle “Around the World in 80 Days” (2004), played Dr. Primkin on “Man About Town” (2006), had a feature role in “Dave Barry's Complete Guide to Guys” (2006) and returned to voice over work as Samuel the Sheep in “Charlotte's Web” (2006) and King Harold in “Shrek the Third” (2007). As for his upcoming projects, Cleese will play the voice role of Dr. Glickenstein in 2008's “Igor” and appear as Chief Inspector Dreyfus in the comedy film “Pink Panther 2” (2009), starring Andy Garcia.

“At my age, I want to wake up and see sunshine pouring in through the windows every day.” John Cleese Awards: Banff Television Festival: Sir Peter Ustinov Award, 2002 Aftonbladet TV Prize (Sweden): Best Foreign TV Personality – Male, 1991 BAFTA Film: Best Actor, “A Fish Called Wanda,” 1989 David di Donatello: Best Screenplay - Foreign Film (Autore della Migliore Sceneggiatura Straniero), “A Fish Called Wanda,“ 1989 Emmy: Outstanding Guest Performer in a Comedy Series, “Cheers,” 1987 Evening Standard British Film: Peter Sellers Award for Comedy, “Clockwise,” 1987 BAFTA TV: Best Light Entertainment Performance, “Fawlty Towers,” 1980 John Cleese - The TV IV John Cleese October 27, 1939 in Weston-super-Mare, Somerset, England, UK Notable Roles 1 AFI Star Award (with Monty Python ) 1 Aftonbladet TV Prize, Sweden 1 Banff Television Festival Sir Peter Ustinov Award Other:

 1 BAFTA Film Award; 1 David di Donatello Award, Italy; 1 Evening Standard British Film Awards Peter Sellers Award for Comedy John Cleese is a British writer, producer, comedian and actor best known for his work as a member of the comedy troupe Monty Python , and for his solo work as creator, writer and star of the British sitcom Fawlty Towers and dozens of subsequent film and TV roles.

Contents 7 Trivia Biography John Marwood Cleese was born in Weston-super-Mare, England on October 27, 1939. Although his family was not well-to-do, he moved around a lot as a child to various small towns in England. His father, Reginald Francis Cleese, was an insurance salesman and World War I veteran, and his mother, Muriel Cross, was a homemaker. Young Cleese was fascinated by making people laugh and by comedy—especially The Goon Show on BBC Radio, but he never considered show business as a career. His biggest dream was to play cricket. After high school, he taught for a couple of years and headed on to Cambridge to study law. At Cambridge, Cleese joined the famous Footlights Club, which performed comedy revues on a real stage. There he met fellow future Python Graham Chapman . At first, Cleese preferred to be a writer and avoided performing—a shyness born from a childhood of being unusually tall—but in 1963, he caught the eye of the BBC, who hired him as a writer for radio. Cleese agreed to it for the steady pay.

After a few years of this, Cleese came to America as part of the Cambridge Revue. He fell in love with the country and stayed for a few years. There he met Terry Gilliam and his future wife Connie Booth . When he returned to England, Cleese went to work writing and performing on BBC television on such shows as The Frost Report and At Last the 1948 Show . In 1969, Cleese was offered the chance to headline his own show with Chapman. They brought together several writer/performers they had worked with, and the show soon became a collaboration. Monty Python's Flying Circus would become one of the most influential and beloved sketch comedies in television history, and unquestionably the most important in BBC history. Feeling that he was not spending enough time with his wife and daughter Cynthia—born 1971—Cleese left the show after three seasons and asked for a chance to work with Booth on his next series. That show, Fawlty Towers , was also a landmark in BBC history, and in 2000, it was named the favorite British TV series of all time by the UK TV industry.

In between the first and second seasons of Fawlty Towers, Cleese and Booth were divorced. Cleese also made two original movies with his fellow Pythons: Monty Python and the Holy Grail and Life of Brian. The latter was released after the second season of Fawlty Towers and it became an international hit, rocketing Cleese and his fellow Pythons to an almost rock star-like status. Cleese and the Pythons again toured America, and after Life of Brian, they made another original film, Monty Python Live at the Hollywood Bowl. Upon completion of the final Monty Python film, The Meaning of Life, Cleese and the Pythons officially split up, although they would continue to work together on other projects. Cleese and Python Michael Palin worked together on two movies which Cleese wrote and starred in—A Fish Called Wanda (the highest grossing British film to date) and Fierce Creatures. In the meanwhile, even before Fawlty Towers, Cleese had begun his own company in collaboration with Tony Jay , Video Arts, which devoted itself to business training videos, often starring Cleese.

Throughout the 80s and 90s, Cleese—by then a sort of legend—continued to make cameo appearances in films and guest appearances on TV shows. In 1987, he won an Emmy as Outstanding Guest Performer in a Comedy Series for his appearance in Cheers . He has since been nominated in that category twice more—in 1998 for 3rd Rock from the Sun and in 2004 for his recurring role as Lyle Finster in the sixth season of Will & Grace . He also received a nomination in 2002 for Outstanding Non-Fiction Special (Informational) for his work as writer, producer and host of the documentary miniseries The Human Face . In 1981, he remarried to Barbara Trentham, with whom he had one child, Camilla, before they were divorced in 1990. He married a third time to Alice Faye Eichelberger in 1992. In more recent years, Cleese has become a fixture in comedy/action movies set in Britain.

He has had notable supporting roles as Nearly Headless Nick in the Harry Potter movies, as the new Q (formerly Q's assistant R) in the James Bond films and as the voice of King Harold in the Shrek movies. He has also lent his voice to several video games, animated movies and commercials. He has co-authored books on psychology and serves as a visiting professor at Cornell University. Roles Fawlty Towers 1x05 - Gourmet Night : Scrambling furiously to deliver the duck which will be the only menu item at his gala gourmet night, Basil Fawlty is pushed to the limit when his car breaks down. Basil curses at the car and threatens to give it a "damn good thrashing!" He runs off and returns with a tree branch, which he beats furiously across the hood and windshield of the car. 2x06 - Basil the Rat : Basil has been serving lunch to a hotel health inspector and trying to hide that a pet rat has escaped into the hotel. As Basil serves the inspector biscuits, the rat sits staring up from the biscuits can at the startled inspector.

Trying to act casual, Basil says, "Would you care for any rat, or...?" Awards and Accolades Phoenix Film Critics Society Awards, USA Nominated: Best Acting Ensemble (2002) - Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets Trivia His family name was originally "Cheese," but his father changed it to avoid being made fun of while he was in the Army in World War I. Cleese regrets the name change, saying his wife, Alice Faye Eichelberger, calls him Jack, and "I liked the idea of being called Jack Cheese." Mother Muriel Cleese (née Cross) had a long, fascinating life. Born November 11, 1899, the armistice declaring the end of World War I happened on her 20th birthday. On her 101st birthday—November 11, 2000—she passed away, having been witness to almost the entire 20th century. Was over 6' tall by the age of twelve. All three of his wives have been blonde American actresses. Has a fascination with psychology, psychiatry and psychotherapy.

Many of his writings use it as a major theme—including an episode of Fawlty Towers , 2x02 - The Psychiatrist . Two of his wives— Connie Booth and Alice Faye Eichelberger—have worked as psychotherapists. And he has co-authored books on psychology (including Families and How to Survive Them) and co-created, written and hosted the documentary miniseries The Human Face , which largely discusses the psychology of facial beauty and recognition. Was both the tallest and the oldest member of Monty Python , with about two inches on Graham Chapman and one year on Terry Gilliam . Starting in 1970, he served for three years as a rector of St. Andrews University in Scotland. In 1989, he joined the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists ( AFTRA ). Despite his long, distinguished career by that point—including an Emmy two years prior and an Oscar nomination the year before—none of the staff recognized him. There are claims he declined the honor of Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1996.

Contrary to some claims, however, he did not turn down knighthood, as Commander is one rank below full knighthood and the right to be addressed as "Sir John Cleese." An Internet piece entitled "The Revocation of Independence," in which (in response to the election of George W. Bush in 2000 and subsequent Bush Administration policies) Britain revokes America's independence, was falsely attributed to him. Although he does have left-leaning politics, he is very fond of America and has resided here for many years, so his own attitude is far from the smug sense of superiority on display in the e-mail forward. In 2005, he had a part of his colon removed in a medical procedure. He subsequently put the tissue removed for sale on his Website. In recognition of his love for lemurs (who figure prominently in his film Fierce Creatures), the recently discovered Malagasy species Cleese's woolly lemur (Avahi cleesei) was named after him.

Question: Which writer and comedian had a family name Cheese, but his father changed it in 1915?
Answer: John Cleese.